Bedfishing

[Alex Burton]

As the spawning season starts what are your views on bedfishing?

[Kyle1387]

I'll take the fall. Love it. I will say it gets boring as hell after a week though. Just be respectful and put em back. It sucks up north because alot of lakes the smallies will spawn right before largies so we get stuck w a month and half straight of it. But thats when I go shad fishing so it works out 

[Rogervang]

Here we go....

[Jinxd12]

SU rules say no bed fishing for the tournament....

 

Edited April 13, 2021 by Jinxd12

[danthefisherman]

Even at an early age I hated doing it. Not that it wasn't sometimes a fun challenge trying to gauge a fish's mood and work it up to bite...but just the fact that the fish is right in front of you, probably knows you're there, and is "eating" your bait to defend their offspring makes it not seem like true fishing to me. Same goes for catching fry guarders by harassing their young.

Lots of guys go out this time of year and catch their personal bests off beds - more power to them so long as they respect the fish and safely let them go to finish their business. For me, I would leave a bedding fish alone even if I knew it would beat my personal best. I want to be proud of catching my new personal best by tricking it to feed, not by taking advantage of its parental instinct to protect its bed. I would not want to try to pretend a catch was "authentic" and be embarrassed when people found out I pulled the fish off a bed.

Whether we enjoy bed fishing or not, I think we can all agree that trophy fish are at a severe disadvantage when they are locked on a bed during the spawn. Some will consider this an opportunity, and others will consider it a shortcut. It's NOT "cheating" to catch a trophy bed fish since when we all have the same opportunity to do so, but catching a bed fish is NOT the same as fooling a wary double digit to eat your bait outside of the spawn. Bed fishermen should not claim their catch was anything more than it was, and anti-bed fishermen shouldn't crucify bed fishermen who responsibly seize the opportunity to catch a big fish.

Just my thoughts

[CG_Fishes]

Bass should have a closed season during their spawn just like the pike, musky and walleye do up here in NY. These fish are at their absolute most vulnerable and 90% of the time when caught they aren't treated properly. I will personally never consider a bed fish a legitimate catch nor will I purposefully target them, but currently it is perfectly legal to do so so I can't hate on people too much. I understand the draw of seeing what could be your PB sitting in front of you, but I just can't morally justify it. That fish is not in the right state of mind, nor does it need any added stress during an already stressful time of the year. I think the most abhorrent are the tournament fishermen who catch the big females off beds and carry them around in a livewell for hours. The fact that tournaments even run during the spawn is baffling to me, but as a whole I think the "weigh in" format is outdated and needs to be revised. But unfortunately, just like bed fishing, it is ingrained in bass fishing culture and there is far too much money involved to change it.

I will leave it with this. With the current regulations, bed fishing is completely legal, it is up to each fisherman to determine what they deem morally and ethically correct and responsible. There is no point in attacking someone bed fishing, just as there is no point in attacking someone for keeping their limit of 5 fish, but if you want to see change start advocating for it to your local conservation agency.

[Jon P]

I love snorkeling around and seeing all the fish up shallow during the spawn, but like Dan said;

3 hours ago, danthefisherman said:

the fact that the fish is right in front of you, probably knows you're there, and is "eating" your bait to defend their offspring

sort of sucks the sport out of it. If I saw a definitive Montanan double digit on a bed I'd have a really hard time not fishing for it. On one hand there is THE FISH I've invested so much time and money fishing for, a definitive state record. But if I caught that fish off a bed I'd run the risk of killing it and spoiling its spawning season. That and it would never feel the same as an "honest" catch. I could catch that fish, and get my record without having broken any laws in Montana. Or I could let the fish be and fish the hell out of the area next pre-spawn. I'm not going to ish on anglers ganking fish off beds, but I'll never be able to do that in good conscience. 

[ricardo]

@mikelongg

[Doomlurker]

The poachers love it.  I couldn’t believe it. Last night some fat losers were walking the shoreline with a high powered flashlight and a long pool net trying to locate and scoop up bedding fish. After yelling at them they killed the light and scurried off to the ish hole they crawled out of. 

[Jon P]

2 hours ago, Doomlurker said:

The poachers love it.  I couldn’t believe it. Last night some fat losers were walking the shoreline with a high powered flashlight and a long pool net trying to locate and scoop up bedding fish. After yelling at them they killed the light and scurried off to the ish hole they crawled out of. 

We get folks treating the spawning season like a second salmon snagging season. Part of what made me stop bed fishing when I was first getting into bass fishing was seeing the number of bass with open wounds or floating dead during the spawn. Not much regulation protecting them in Montana so there's rarely consequence. 

[SVT THUNDER]

I spent almost 8 years fishing tournaments and guiding full time over a decade ago. I did bed fish occasionally in bigger tournaments in the first two years. I caught the bucks but never the female. It wasn’t by choice. It was just easier to get the male to commit. I absolutely sucked at it. I hated fishing that way simply because it wastes so much time and quite frankly...it’s boring and there was zero fun involved. Plus, it was not doing my amateur partner any favors. I can count on both hands how many times I actually did bed fish. It just wasn’t productive for me. 

Somewhere in that 2 year time frame, I moved to a house that was on the lake. I had a short, dead end canal that ran along part of my yard and boathouse. It was just wide enough that I could turn my 21’ boat around with the trolling motor in one spot. Maybe 30 yards long. But overhanging trees on the other side and the hard, rocky bottom made it a prime bedding location. It was 3-4’ deep and the mouth was deeper water that opened up into the lake. 

So I spent a lot of time looking over that sea wall that spring. As the bass began bedding, I couldn’t help but sit there through the spawn when I was home and watch. It was really an amazing experience. There were usually at least 4 beds with big females on them. I watched the males run away small bream and an occasional turtle. I watched a big female inhale a bluegill and burst away from her bed and blow the bluegill out. She came back to the bed. The more time I spent watching this, the more I knew I’d never bed fish again. Me and my now wife even named them. 

 When I saw boats coming into that canal, I’d throw a few big rocks in the areas that had no beds and muddy up the water so they couldn’t see the bedding bass . So that’s where I am on the topic. I don’t do it anymore. Yes, every year I catch bass that are in shallow water and some even have milt coming out. So I do catch bass that were on a bed, but it wasn’t visible or intentional. That’s just going to happen in the spring when you’re catching them shallow.

But the only type of tournaments I fish anymore are either online catch and release tournaments or the bass cash bash where you register and if you catch a tagged bass, you win $1500, a boat or a truck. I don’t ever say anything to anglers that I see bed fishing. I mind my on business. But I don’t do it anymore myself. 

Several years ago, we had an issue with a couple of guys going around and shooting big females on bed with bow and arrows. They just left the dead bass in the water with the arrow hole through them. Mostly DD bass. We finally found out who they were and the game wardens took over from there. They caught them and they ended up in jail. That’s about as low as you can go in my book. I’ll shut up now. 

[kellen.3]

Don’t think I could bed fish myself but can’t judge others for doing so. I just hope they take all the precautions to get the fish back into the water ASAP. However, to play devils advocate, what would you say to guys who say, “if you don’t bed fish, you better not hunt during the rut”.

[Thiskidlikes2fish]

I personally bed fish and I understand both sides to it. I believe if you are going to bed fish you need to do it the right way. Don’t take the fish out of the water for more than a minute and that is a little to much. Get a weight a few pictures and maybe a measurement. But get it back in the water as fast as possible where you caught it from. We all learn from experience I have definitely change the way I bed fish. One time years ago I caught a bedding fish 3 times in 24 hours and I am ashamed I ever did something like that but I have definitely changed the way I do things.

[xxlbass]

god I hate this fn topic....im gonna add some sarcasm to it.  I hate fn bed fishing but I will fn put a quad treble in yo ass any other time a year lmfao.   

[willlliw]

I don't bed fish partly because most of the water bodies I fish are small and the number of large fish are small, so possibly intervening in the spawning process seems wrong. My question is however is when it the time to fish for them and not? The fish in my lake seem to gather up in wolf packs for a few weeks or so and then pair up and leave to spawn. This time period when they are packed up is some of the most fun fishing of the year for me, but would catching a pair cruising around the shore be disruptive too? Just wondering, I want to capitalize on the fishing opportunities since the lake is very difficult to fish the rest of the year, but id like to stay away from possibly spawning fish.